


Adoption

by Corvid_Knight



Series: Integrated Worlds [3]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: AU, Adoption, Gen, Lusus death, my tumblr is knight-of-heart-and-art, setup for one of my rarepairs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-02
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2019-05-01 08:18:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14516211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Corvid_Knight/pseuds/Corvid_Knight
Summary: Dualscar's called out to deal with a badly injured wild lusus. Turns out it's not so wild; it has a troll kid, and now that kid needs a new guardian. Luckily Dualscar knows exactly who that guardian should be.





	Adoption

The lusus is barely alive when you get there; you kneel beside it, wary of the pincers, and put one hand on its shell, just waiting like that until the great white eyestalks droop and go blank. There's been reports of this big guy being overly protective and territorial for a couple perigees now, but it'd never hurt anyone, so until someone reported it as injured the decision was made to leave it alone. 

You kind of hate that you only get to see it dying and dead. Carcinoform lusii are fairly rare; you would have liked to see this one in good health.

For now, though, you need a couple pics of the body. And your partner has the camera. Damn. "Yo, Iarrae—" 

"Dualscar, you might wanna see this," she says at the same moment you try to call her over. 

What you _want_ is to finish this job and go somewhere that is a little bit farther away from the siren call of the ocean, but on the off chance that there's something important you head over to where the goldblood's standing. She's peering into a crevice between a pair of standing rocks, and after a moment spent hoping that there's nothing in there that wants to bite your face off you nudge her aside and take a look. 

It takes your eyes a second to adjust. 

Oh. _Oh._

There's a kid. A tiny troll, maybe two or three sweeps, wedged back as far away from you and Iarrae as he can get. Welp, you just figured out why the crab lusus was so territorial; it wanted to keep its charge safe. And as far as you can tell it did a pretty good job, too; the kid doesn't look hurt, just terrified. 

"Fuckin' paperwork," Iarrae mumbles, twisting the end of her braid through her fingers. 

"Lucky for you that you're the junior here, and _I'm_ the one who gets stuck with that." Not that you're not used to this. Maybe a quarter of the lusii that you're called on to put down or that you find dead are raising troll kids; even if adult trolls have started adopting wrigglers from the caverns, there's still plenty that get picked up by a lusus. It's normal. Causes paperwork, but it's normal. 

It's not really your job to wrangle the orphans, but you stick your arm down in the crevice to try and grab the kid, wincing as you scrape one sensitive ear-fin against the rock. And you can't even reach him, anyway; all this accomplishes is to make him growl and shift a little, huddling in the corner away from you. 

Which brings his arm (and the rip in his shirt, and the _bright red_ blood on it) into view. 

Your breath catches. 

"Holy shit," you murmur, extricating your arm and watching the kid for a second. 

He's a mutant. A _blood_ mutant, just about the rarest thing on this planet; no wonder he's being raised by a rare lusus out in the middle of fucking nowhere. Trolls don't cull for blood color anymore, but lusii don't know that, and not everyone will adopt a candy-red. 

You know someone who will, though. 

"Iarrae?"

"Yep." 

"Pull him outta there for me?" 

The gold huffs out an irritated breath; you can almost feel her glaring at your back. "This isn't our job. Besides, don't you have two of your own? Do you _really_ need another wriggler?" 

"Shut the fuck up and psionic him out. Unless you want me to pull rank on you?" 

You don't technically outrank her. Your job description is exactly the same as hers: lusus handling specialist, also known as Orphaner even if the only reasons you're supposed to kill lusii are in defense or mercy. But you _are_ violet to her gold, seadweller, experienced as hell in fighting things ten times your size. And you're not exactly a small troll, either. Hell, you're not even a _medium_ troll. No, you went straight to "huge, intimidating asshole." 

After a moment's staring match with said huge intimidating asshole, Iarrae huffs again and crosses her arms, eyes flaring pure bright yellow as she glances over at the rock crevice.  
The little troll inside screeches like he's being ripped apart, and you give her a warning glance that she returns with pure ire. He comes out in one piece, though, even if he is flailing wildly at being suspended by crackling yellow lightning. 

You reach over and catch the scruff of his neck, holding him at that pressure point that's an evolutionary trigger to make any kid of your species go limp and noncombative. It's surprisingly hard to get a good grip; he must be older than you thought, just small for his age. That, or the mutation's messing everything up. 

Going by your experience with Signless, you're betting on the latter. 

"That's a fucking mutant," Iarrae observes, letting her psionics dissolve and leaving you with the kid's weight. "What the hell do you want with it?" 

_It._ Her saying it like that makes you want to spread your fins and hiss in challenge. 

Instead, you adjust your grip on the kid, avoiding the small sharp teeth when you let go of his scruff and pull him in to rest on your hip. The brat keeps trying to fight even as he grabs your cloak for balance; Signless is going to _love_ him. "First off, I'm pretty sure it's a _he_. Second, fuck right the hell off with why I want him; you're not the one who's gotta do the paperwork for him. Third...what's your name, kiddo?" 

You change your tone for that last question, letting your voice slip down to that almost-crooning register that's specific to seadwellers, mostly used on quadmates and wrigglers. Iarrae snorts at your using it here, but the kid calms just a little bit, even if his blunt claws are currently digging into your arm because he's hanging on for dear life. 

After a second of silence, Iarrae points out, "He's lusii-raised and a mutant, he probably doesn't even know how to talk—" 

"Karkat-fuck-you," the kid says, all one word, and then flattens himself against your side, baring little babyteeth at her. 

The gold shows him much sharper teeth right back. "You look like a _snack,_ brat. Candy-red; that's supposed to be sweet, right? What kind of troll doesn't even have horns—" 

" _Iarrae!_ " You can't keep a snarl out of your voice; perhaps you don't even want to. There's no reason for her to be this damn cruel towards a wriggler, even if he's a mutant with horns so tiny that they're almost hidden in his mess of hair. You can feel them press against your chest as Karkat whines and presses his face into your shirt, though. "Leave the kid the fuck alone. Get the pics of the lusus—"

"Crabdad," Karkat mumbles into your shirt, and you have to contain your wince. Poor kid. 

"Get pics, sweep the area for any of the kid's belongings, and we can—" 

"I'm not hunting down its nest." Iarrae cuts you off, folding her arms and glaring at Karkat for a second. "Not my fuckin' job." And before you can quell your urge to reach over and knock some respect into her, she's stomping back over to the dead lusus. 

...okay, first order of business when you get home is to write a recommendation that she gets transferred to some job where she doesn't have to handle kids. _Or_ mutants. It's easier on everybody that way.

* * *

Karkat reluctantly directs you to where his stash of belongings are hidden; it's a burrow dug into the less-sandy soil by the crab lusus, the entrance cleverly camouflaged with a clump of sandgrass. You can actually squeeze yourself into the entrance, just barely; the lusus dug it wide enough that it could fit in here with the kid. 

The kid in question squirms until you put him down, immediately bolting farther into the hole. For a second you almost panic—losing him would be really shitty; you'll have to call in help to locate him again, because you have a feeling Iarrae is _not_ going to cooperate—but he only goes ten feet or so, to a pile at the end of the burrow. 

You get a reflexive growl when you come over to check out what he's grabbing; he's picked up territorial instinct from his lusus. Until you bow your head and click deep in your throat to show submission, you actually think he's going to attack, even as small as he is. 

...damn, this must be a funny sight. A fully-grown seadweller submitting to one of the smallest wrigglers you've ever seen. Signless would find it symbolic, probably. 

"Want me to carry your stuff, kiddo? You need to take what you want now; we're not coming back." 

He whines deep in his throat at that statement, glancing up at you for just a second as he tugs a blanket free and starts piling stuff in the middle of it. "But _Crabdad..._ " 

...oh, _shit._ You're not trained for the grief-counseling thing; this isn't something you know how to handle. What can you even say to him? 

"Your crabdad can't take care of you anymore, Karkat," you tell him as gently as you can. "I want to take you home with me, have a friend adopt you." 

" _Won't_." It's not the sulky denial that comes before a tantrum; you're familiar enough with that from Eridan and Cronus. No, this is a different kind of no. Like he's just telling you something that you don't get, because you're an idiot adult. 

"Well, I can't leave you here, kiddo." 

"Won't _want_ me." Oh, fuck. His lower lip's trembling as he ties the blanket up in a clumsy knot around his things; he only resists for a second when you scoop him up, getting him settled before you pick up the bundle. "Bad." 

"Bad?" Oh, wait. You actually know _exactly_ what this is about. "Nah, you're not bad. He's like you—candy-red, with one kid of his blood caste already." 

Karkat lets out a questioning chirp, and big yellow eyes blink up at you in pure surprise. 

He's fucking _adorable_ , you think, and get a surge of parent-instinct. _Stop that. This isn't your kid; you already_ have _two, you idiot._

Your hormones do not agree with that assessment. Dammit.

* * *

Iarrae's left the camera and a note on the front seat of the car; the latter's scribbled in her horrible handwriting, and it takes you a minute to puzzle out that she's telling you that she's decided to walk home, rather than be in the car with, quote, "a stupid useless feral abomination of a wriggler." 

Well, damn. Somebody's angry. Your advisement that she be transferred is going to be _very_ strongly worded. 

But this does mean that you don't have to handle Iarrae's glares and exasperated sighs as you dig the first aid kit out of the backseat and clean Karkat's cut arm up. It's not very bad, at least; just a shallow, clean cut up his forearm. He growls and whimpers as you clean it up, but stays mostly still. Good kid. 

"What happened, anyway?" you ask him as you wait for the disinfectant to dry so you can bandage it, not really expecting an answer. 

He gives you one anyway, though. " _Big_ meowbeast." Oh, there's that lower lip tremble again. "Crabdad killed it, but it hurt him..." 

Ouch. One more mystery solved; the crab lusus got killed by some kind of wild lusus, probably. A bonded lusus wouldn't attack one of its own kind with a ward. 

The kid's sniffling, rubbing his eyes with the hand that's attached to the arm you're working on. You finish wrapping the bandage around his arm and secure it in place, then sit down on the hood of the car next to him and pull him into your lap, shooshing him when he loops his arms around your neck and presses his face against your skin. 

His tears are almost hot enough to burn your gills, but having you hold and cuddle him gets him to stop crying pretty quickly. 

He's really too small to ride without a some kind of extra safety harness, but it's not like anybody's going to call you on it. And you can drive carefully.

* * *

Karkat falls asleep on the drive, but rouses as soon as you go to pick him up. He snarls at you for a moment, then stops and shakes the sleep out of his head, blinking up at you in confusion. 

"Come on, kiddo," you tell him, and he nods, holding his arms out to be picked up. 

Dolorosa meets you at the door, flanked by Eridan on one side and Aranea on the other, both of them half-hiding behind her skirts. Eridan in particular is giving you a wholly betrayed look; _you're_ not supposed to bring kids that aren't him or his brother here. 

"Who—" Dolorosa starts. That's as far as she gets, though, because you hand Karkat off to her and scoop up Eridan, setting him up on your shoulder, grinning at how he squeals and evading the small hands grabbing at your horns for maybe three seconds before you let him get ahold of them. 

"Miss me?" 

The only response you get from him is an excited shriek of "Daddy!" Which answers the question pretty well, actually. 

Aranea is staring up at Karkat with rapt fascination, and he's returning the look even as Dolorosa shifts her grip on him to look him over. Once she's satisfied herself that yes, this is a small troll who isn't too badly injured or obviously mistreated, she settles him on her hip and raises one eyebrow at you, stepping out of the door to let you pass. 

"I wasn't aware you were planning on adopting another, Dualscar." There's no rebuke in her voice, just curiosity. 

"He's not mine." Eridan's safely situated on your shoulder; you hold out your arms for Karkat again, and the jadeblood turns him over. "Mutants are hard to find a home for; I figured I'd bypass all the hassle and bring him to Signless. His name's Karkat; his lusus...well, it was one of today's jobs." 

Her eyes widen a little at that, and she chirrs in sympathy. " _Ah._ " 

"So we don't gotta keep him?" Eridan whispers in your ear. You can't tell if he's disappointed or relieved. 

"No, you jealous little wriggler, we're not keeping him," you tell him, and set Karkat down on the floor, patting his shoulder as Aranea takes a cautious step closer. At least he's not growling at her. For a moment Eridan won't let go of your horns when you go to put him down as well; he drags your head a little to the side before he reluctantly turns you loose. Ow. "Go take him to meet the others, Eri; be nice." As your youngest grabs Karkat's hand and pulls him towards the main playroom, you turn your attention to Dolorosa again. "Who's here, anyway?" 

She shrugs. "Mindfang's older one, Feferi, the Captors, my two of course, and a pair of human twins that belong to a diplomat, I believe. Today's a light day." 

Ten kids. Hopefully not _too_ overwhelming for Karkat. "Any idea where Signless is? He isn't answering messages." 

"You know he doesn't carry his comm everywhere with him." 

"Obstinate fuck." 

That earns you a disapproving frown and a smack to your upper arm. "This is why Cronus and Mituna have dirty mouths, Dualscar. You and Mindfang don't censor yourself—" 

"Okay, okay, I'll think of something else to call him." You have to dodge the next smack, because she aims it higher up, in the direction of your sensitive gills. "Rosa—" 

In the other room, Karkat snarls and Cronus yelps, and you drop the playful argument in favor of heading in to check on those two, with Dolorosa right on your heels. 

Cronus is standing in the middle of the room with his bleeding hand in his mouth, staring at Karkat with an expression that you recognize as bafflement. Even though he's easily half again as large as Karkat and the smaller troll just bit him, your older son's not making any move to attack, which makes you suspect he provoked this somehow. 

Since Karkat's half-crouched in front of Eridan, obviously guarding, you have a good idea what Cronus did. 

"He _bit_ me," Cronus announces, showing you his hand and the violet smeared across it as you kneel down between the two of them. 

"You detherved it," Sollux points out from where he's sitting with a little blonde human boy—one of the twins Dolorosa mentioned, you're sure. "That'th what you get for teathing Eridan, doofuth." 

"I vwasn't gonna hurt him!" Cronus protests, looking back over at you. "It's _teasing,_ come on, he _bit_ me!" 

Dolorosa brushes past you and takes Cronus's hand, examining the bite. "You've had worse, Cronus. Come along, and we'll clean it up." 

So Karkat's both a fighter and a protector? Yeah, this kid was meant to be with Signless. 

"No biting," you tell Karkat as she leads Cronus into the other room, and immediately regret how stern your tone is when two translucent pink tears roll out of his eyes and his shoulders start hitching. 

"I'm _sorry..._ " It comes out in a too-loud wail, and everyone in the room winces. 

Amazingly, Eridan's the one who wraps his arms around Karkat, pulling him in and making soft noises that aren't quite shooshing as the little candyblood buries his face in his purple shirt. Karkat's still talking, but it's muffled past discernability. 

You settle so you're sitting on the floor anyway and pull both of them into your lap. "Calm down, Karkat." 

"Sorry, sorry, sorry sorry sorry—" 

Holy shit, he's upset now. Eridan's curled up around him, still trying to calm him down; after a second Sollux groans and gets up, dragging the human boy to come join the kid pile that you're _apparently_ at the center of. (The human tries to hang back until Sollux sighs, says, "Come _on,_ Dirk," and yanks him down into the pile. )

...fine. 

"Kanaya, do you know where my laptop is?" 

She does. And she fetches it for you, before cuddling up between Aranea and Eridan. It's a little difficult to type with a lapful of purring wrigglers, but you manage it.

* * *

Eventually, Dolorosa comes back and helps shift the kids into a blanket pile without waking up the ones who're asleep, and you're able to relocate to a room that's devoid of small children. The forms you have to fill out for today are much easier to complete there; an hour and a half later you've printed out the papers Signless will need to keep Karkat, confirmed that the carcinoform lusus died of natural causes, and gotten confirmation that Iarrae will be transferred to a field that'll keep her away from kids and mutants. 

That last one is a relief.

When you come back into the playroom, Mituna's holding one end of a cable that a boy who looks just like the first human kid but with hair that's almost white rather than blond, both of them giggling. Cronus and Aranea are arguing over a puzzle or something, Sollux and Eridan are asleep in a pile with the first human—Dirk? You think his name was Dirk—and Kanaya and Feferi are both _trying_ to work the tangles out of a squirming, whining Karkat's hair. 

That doesn't seem to be going too well. When Karkat notices you come in, he gives you a look that very plainly says _help._

Kanaya clicks unhappily when you scoop the mutant up, but Karkat just chirrs. 

"How come he doesn't have gills like Kankri and Cro and me?" Feferi asks, setting the brush she'd been using on Karkat down and sitting back on her heels to look up at you. "He says his blood's like Kankri's." 

Hm. You don't really have an answer to that, other than that Signless doesn't have gills either. "Different mutations, maybe." 

"Bad," Karkat mutters, tightening his grip on your neck a little. 

"Shush, Karkat. You're not bad." 

"Bad?" Kanaya asks. 

"Red's _bad,_ " he insists again, before you can explain. "I'm _fucked_ up." 

Feferi giggles, and across the room so does Mituna; blue and red sparks go everywhere as the psionic drops the cable. The white-haired human kid scowls at him, crossing his arms. 

"Jerk," he snaps. 

"Fucker," Mituna says right back, and you have to resist the urge to groan. 

"Asshole," the human says, and you set Karkat down and go over to pick him up instead before this can escalate any further, putting one finger over his lips.

" _Shush_." 

He blinks at you with almost luminous red eyes, mouth curving up into a mischievous smile before he nods and grabs your wrist with both hands, pulling your hand down from his face. "Hi." 

"Hello yourself, kiddo. I'm guessing you're Dirk's twin?" But he shakes his head firmly. "No?"

"Dirk's _my_ twin," the kid corrects you. "I'm Hal." 

"And I'm Dualscar." 

"Uh-huh. Cronus said you're his dad. Cronus says you didn't make him like D made me, he says you picked him and Eridan out." 

"Cronus is right; that's how trolls do things. They pick out grubs or wrigglers and raise them. Humans have kids that're related to the parents." 

" _I'm_ not." 

"You're related to Dirk." 

"Nuh-uh. I'm an _android._ " He says that word very carefully, like he's proud of being able to pronounce it; while you're still processing the statement he wiggles in your grip, pointing at Mituna. "Down. I want my cord." 

Okay then. 

As you put Hal down, the door opens, and Signless and a blond human who's almost as tall as you come in. Hal shrieks and runs to the latter; the former smiles at you and nods in greeting. 

"Dualscar," he says. He looks _tired_ ; then again, he usually does. "Rosa told me I needed to stop by here before I went home; you had something for me?" 

"Why the hell do you read her messages and not mine?" The question's mostly-rhetorical, and the only answer Signless gives you is another smile and a vague gesture. You shake your head and go over to pick Karkat up again, carrying him over to your friend. "It's not something, anyway; it's some _one._ This is Karkat." 

Signless's eyes go wide enough that you can clearly see the bright red irises against the yellow of his sclera. " _Oh._ Hello, little one." 

Karkat chirrs worriedly, clinging to you for a second. "...hi." 

"Can you come here?" Signless asks, holding out his arms. He's not asking you to hand Karkat over; he's asking the kid to come to him. The difference is slight but significant, and after a moment Karkat's grip on your shirt relaxes and he leans toward the adult mutant, making a soft sound as he's transferred. "Now, how did Dualscar end up with such a special wriggler as you?" 

"I was called out because of his lusus," you tell him, because you're not sure if Karkat understands that part yet. Signless nods in understanding, then looks down as Karkat sniffles. 

"Crabdad's dead," the kid says, then hides his face in Signless's dark shirt. 

You leave your friend to calm his new kid, and go over to the human, who seems to be trying to put Hal down. Trying and failing. 

"C'mon, man—" 

"No! Carry _me_!" 

"Let me get Dirk out and in his seat first—" 

" _No_!" Hal almost screams the word, twisting up two handfuls of his adult's shirt and holding on. 

The adult in question looks over at you and grins apologetically, one hand coming up to adjust his sunglasses. "Hey. Sorry about the noise; we're having technical issues." 

"Carry _me,_ " Hal demands again, and you have to laugh. 

"This is a loud place," you tell the blond human, gesturing at all the other children here. "Yours is hardly the loudest. My name's Dualscar Ampora; are your twins really androids?" 

"D Strider. And this one is." He bounces Hal a little, sighing at the boy's giggle. "Dirk's just plain human; they're at about the same place developmentally." 

"Um. Why?" 

"It's a _long_ story." D grins at you and tries to put Hal down again. Nope, that's not happening. "Hal. Please." 

"No!" 

"Let me solve this problem," you offer, before Hal can scream again. Dirk's _very_ deeply asleep; he stays completely limp as you extricate him from how he's curled up with Eridan and Sollux, mumbling sleeptalk as you settle him against you and straighten up again, raising one eyebrow at D. 

The human gives you a thankful grin and a thumb's-up, and leads the way out to the parking lot. 

"You're a fucking lifesaver," he tells you once he's got his twins strapped in. "Hal's stubborn—they both are—and he woulda just kept going until Dirk woke up." 

"This is easier," you agree, and shake his hand when he offers it even though that's not a normal custom with trolls. "Are you planning on dropping them here often?" 

"Yeah, probably." Another friendly grin as he opens the driver's door. "See you around, dude." 

Hm. Interesting. 

You wave in answer to Hal's waving, then head back inside to collect your kids so you can head home.

**Author's Note:**

> Dolorosa just runs a daycare for all the kids and any adult who wanders in has to help wrangle them. That's just how things are. 
> 
> In this AU, troll may be raised by lusii or by adult trolls who adopt them! Or by a combination of the two, like Karkat.
> 
> (also this is one of those fics that if you draw literally anything out of it I will scream and also die for you.)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Diamond Sky](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14685108) by [Michael Stonožka (JewJitsue)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JewJitsue/pseuds/Michael%20Stono%C5%BEka)




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